


kids that I once knew

by ygrittebardots



Series: the gathering fire [2]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Canon, Body Horror, Gen, Revolution, Slavery
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-02-08
Updated: 2015-02-08
Packaged: 2018-03-11 03:09:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 579
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3311696
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ygrittebardots/pseuds/ygrittebardots
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This is Melee and Anakin at sixteen, traveling across the desert in secret with nothing but medical supplies and an illegal tracking chip detector.</p>
            </blockquote>





	kids that I once knew

“Mel, we have to  _move_.”

Quiet as a lothcat, Melee lets herself drop from the adobe ledge, the sand below muffling both her fall and his mere seconds later. All is quiet but for the distant sounds of the more refined sections of the city settling down for the night. Then there’s the flickering of lamplight, and a hushed conversation from up above, and she can make out two silhouettes in the waning dusk.

She doesn’t ask how he knew.

She’s long-since stopped needing an explanation.

Then the silhouettes disappear, and for a moment all is still once more. She glances over at her friend’s face, set in a concentrated frown. Then he glances at her, nods tightly once, and with a sudden grin and his left hand in hers, they’re off again.

This is how it is, to be Melee and Anakin at sixteen.

It is to feel with every softly thumping step the weight of medical supplies strapped heavy across her shoulders, the tight stretch of the scar across her cheek where she dug out her own tracking chip three years before, the squeeze of Anakin’s hand tight around hers and knowing that it’s the only one he’s got, the fast-cooling desert air coursing through her lungs in gasps and the pounding of their wrapped feet kicking up sand in their wake. It is to feel these things and know that this is a stolen freedom, and that they’d accept no other kind.

The slave district of Bestine is far larger than the one they grew up in, and only slightly better guarded, but after five weeks spent already in the city, Anakin and Melee more than know their way around. Slipping momentarily under the protection of towering clay walls as the night watch passes by, they then keep to the shadows for the short remainder of their silent journey.

Anakin raps his knuckles against the door as quietly as he can, to be greeted by a hushed and harried, “What do you want? Who are you?” by the twi’lek man who answers the door. But the lines on his face are worn and worried, and left there long before his time, so Anakin’s voice is soft and reassuring when he says, “A friend.”

The twi’lek’s eyes dart quickly between him and Melee, fear and mistrust written there still, so wordlessly she hands her pack off to Anakin and begins to peel her shirt up, soon leaving her back fully exposed to him. She feels the strange man’s gaze on her, taking in the network of black ink spiraling in curves and right angles from a single image at the base of her neck, so much older and harsher than the rest. She feels Anakin’s gaze, too, though this is hardly a new sight to him. And when the twi’lek’s finger brushes against her spine, she doesn’t shudder. She’s used to it, the curiosity, the amazement that these marks of a free woman should grow from that unmistakable central design. Gardulla’s eye.

Melee drops her shirt back in place the moment she feels his touch disappear from her skin. But when she turns, the twi’lek’s eyes are wider, kinder, no longer fearful but filled with a new kind of tentativeness. Anakin, clutching her pack fiercely between his right arm and torso lest he lose the treasure it holds, offers his hand, and when the man takes it in his, Melee steels herself. They have work to do.


End file.
